I bought a dual disc a while back, and recently I just got around to listening to the DVD side. I was surprised to find out the audio on the DVD side was only 192kbps 48Khz AC3 audio. The 53 minutes of AC3 audio in only about 73MB. Is this actually supposed to sound better than the CD audio side of the disc?
It might sound "better" if it's 5.1 surround... Or, if it's mixed/mastered differently it might sound different/, or better. But, if it's regular 'ol 2-channel stereo, I don't see the point.
No, the Dolby Digital (AC3) won't sound better than the CD side.
The concept of DualDisc was a CD and a DVD back to back. What was on the DVD side was up to the record company. It was sometimes a HiRez DVD-A or a DVD-V with at least LPCM sound. Some record companies (like Sony) thought any content would do and did just Dolby Digital sound. Now if that was in (5.1) surround it could have added something but else?
The Dual disc was short lived, it turned out that the public preferred a separate CD and DVD, also that would be the same production cost or less.
I had bought a DualDisc once, David Bowie's "Reality".
I was disappointed to find that, despite the marketing hype, there wasn't any DVD-A audio (which would be indicated by an AUDIO_TS directory on the disc). I suppose some DualDisc releases had high-rez DVD-A audio, but the album I bought didn't, and apparently not yours either.
What mine did have was a standard "DVD player" DVD (VIDEO_TS folder). There was one "program" that had 16/48 stereo PCM with title cards for the songs, and a second program that had a short film set to the music in 5.1 48k AC3.
The 5.1 mix was disappointing too, by the way. If I hadn't known it was surround, I may have mistook it for the stereo mix. I'd compare it more to stereo that's been upmixed, than something that truly utilizes all the channels, like the quadraphonic Dark Side of the Moon, or The Flaming Lips' 5.1 releases.
No wonder the format failed...